May MATS Bootcamp - Marine Mashup
The MATS (Make Art That Sells) assignment for this month was a marine mashup of marine life and pattern for a plate design. I focused on the following crustaceans: shrimp, crab and lobster. I researched online, looked in my marine life book, doodled and sketched them first. Part of the instructions in the mini was to illustrate the crustaceans in a dark color and then work on vibrant patterns as well. Even though it is the biggest sin ever to use black watercolor (ivory), I used it for this because I was using it by itself and not mixing with other colors to get a dark shade. I discovered I love working with it and it was fun to work with pure values, black and white.
So once I got that done I worked on my patterns. I used my compass to draw circles and then I painted the backgrounds using cool toned sea-glass colors. Lastly I painted the hand lettering as well. I scanned in all of my elements at 600 dpi and once I got the compositions the way I wanted them, I merged them together in Photoshop. I completed the finishing touches as a mock-up design using this tutorial. I love my final result and if any of my favorite stores like Anthropologie or Crate and Barrel are interested, it would be a dream come true to stock these in your shops. Just sayin'.
Hope you're having a great day!